


Grand Inquisitor Drabbles

by moomkin



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: Rebels
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-24
Updated: 2018-10-06
Packaged: 2019-05-13 09:17:46
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,242
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14746067
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/moomkin/pseuds/moomkin
Summary: Drabbles about the GI





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Request #1
> 
> "Inky practicing how to dance b/c he has a date in the first time since...Well, ever, and though he knows how to fight he doesn't know how to dance."

The Grand Inquisitor could not dance.

Normally this was not a problem. It only became a problem - _his_ problem - thanks to a nervous informant. They had information and was ready to offer it on a possible Force sensitive youngling.

The informant would only divulge the information at a ball being hosted by one of the wealthiest families on their world. One of those annoying “hiding in the open” tactics the nervous thought would make them safe. _It would be discreet._ The Grand Inquisitor hated them. Those who were new to the game. As if dancing with a nearly 2 meter tall Pau’an at a ball would be discreet.

But the informant had their reasons. They were under close supervision. They couldn’t get away to talk. They were too nervous to send information over the HoloNet. 

In fact, all they sent was a message saying they wished to talk on a subject the Grand Inquisitor was interested in along with an invitation to the ball.

The Grand Inquisitor knew nothing of dancing.

Killing? Yes. Combat? Yes. Dancing? No.

He’d heard of combat being described as a dance of sorts. If he dared to recall days long forgotten, when he himself was a wide-eyed ignorant little whelp of a Jedi protegee, he could recall some of his masters using the same poetic injustice.

Killing was killing.

Combat was combat.

And dance?

It was nonsense.

Though, the Grand Inquisitor mused to himself, if he did not like the information he received, he could very easily turn this dance into something far more his style.

So even if the idea was ridiculous, he would indulge.

The high likelihood of the dance ending in death increased the Inquisitor’s interest in the subject, and he turned to his archives for answers.

Once tossed aside as worthless drivel, now the subject of dancing had to be consulted.

It was drivel indeed.

Though, as the Grand Inquisitor watched himself mimic the steps before a mirror, he could see the application of such grace in killing. The measured steps. The poise. It was a fine outlet for someone as flexible and athletic as him.

He drew his lightsaber and slashed at his imaginary partner as he completed an imaginary dip.

He turned around, pulled off a perfectly acceptable pierrot, and slashed at another imaginary ball guest. And their partner. He wheeled around the imaginary ballroom, slashing at imaginary frightened and screaming guests, interspersing the murderous thrusts of his blade with _sissonne_ jumps.

The Grand Inquisitor didn’t realize how lost in the artform he’d become until he’d imaginarily murdered all the ball guests, and stood in the center of the room, bowing to himself in the mirror. With a flick of his wrist, the lightsaber powered down, and he returned it to its holster on his back.

He sighed.

He really did not want to admit that there was some enjoyable aspect to the concept. The art form was truly a softened expression of the combat he had been trained in. And to add beauty to the murder of those beneath him? Surely that wasn’t all bad.

The Grand Inquisitor moved on to his next task. And perhaps his next chance to murder another pathetic lowlife.

Finding an outfit to wear to a ball.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For Imperial :3

He remembered when the ships arrived. The entire sky caught on fire. The ground shook. The clan stood outside, on their feet, palms pressing outward towards the horror in the traditional display of warning.

The ships were not threatened.

He remembered when the strangers arrived. Small, with strange skin the color of mud and sand - not the color of strong rock like the Pau’an - ugly flat feet, terrifying white eyes.

He remembered the tests most of all. The ones with the brown robes came. They took his blood. They did not explain what it was. Or why they were doing it.

But there was something about him that was wrong. And they took him away.

He remembered when he arrived at the Temple. The cold halls. The cold others. The cold language he was taught. There were no others like him there. No one he could preserve his words with. And so he lost them.

They told him he was special. That he had a mastery over something they called the Force. And that was why he was taken away. 

That was why they took his language away, too. He had to transcend the things that made him alien, and accept the things that were beyond mere species.

That was why they forced him to eat their food. The meat they ruined with fire, drained of its blood... it was disgusting to him. To eat meat that was cooked. But there was no other way. 

They taught him the only way special people like him were allowed to eat was the human way... to speer his food with weapons, instead of scooping it up with his hands. Even if the idea was terrifying - to pierce something that was sustience the way one would take life, and then put an instrument of death into his mouth - it was the only way that was acceptable.

The alien way had to be removed. That was special.

But the Jedi way - the _human_ way - that was all that was allowed.

Because that was what he slowly learned the Jedi were. Everything about the Temple life was a mimicry of human culture. There were human beds - the entire class did not sleep together in a group in the meeting hall in a show of family unity and solidarity. No, they slept together in isolation. In gut-wrenching, fearful isolation.

Even the other aliens learned the human way. None of the other aliens seemed to mind. There were some who had known the humans for a long time. The Twi’leks. They’d been accustomed to human culture and adapted easily.

Some aliens had arrived when they were infants. They knew nothing else.

Not him.

He recalled being stripped from his mother’s arms. 

He recalled everything being wrong. Everything that made him a Pau’an. All of it had to be erased. Removed. Replaced with the _correct_ human things.

He remembered the way the humans looked down on him. Even the high and mighty Jedi. The tolerate and transending Force weilders. They loathed his skin. They recoiled at his teeth. They even mocked his combat skills as something that would come naturely to an alien. Always something that could not be helped. The things that he could not change. 

For change he did. Even though it hurt. Even if it filled him with terror. He changed. He adopted their language and their traditions and their code of life. And it was not enough.

He remembered when the chance came for him to find a Master, and he remembered volunteering to be a Temple Guard instead. If only to wear a mask. To no longer be different. To be unseen.

And it was bliss.

To stand and have others not so much as cast a secondary glance. To speak and be heard. To stand tall. 

But it was not enough.

The pain was already there, bubbling beneath the surface. 

Wearing a mask did not hide the fact that only when he was presumed human was he seen as an equal. 

And after everything he was asked to forget, this was something he would always remember.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt #3 
> 
> Based on a conversation through comments with ashangel101010 about if the GI ever met Thrawn.

Grand Admiral Thrawn was surprised when he learned there were other aliens in the Emperor's service.

Surprised, and curious.

He'd been the only one in the Imperial Navy, and even if he didn't quite understand why he received such disdain from his human counterparts when he was obviously so well suited to his role as Grand Admiral, he accepted it. He had bigger goals in mind than making the Navy reflect the galaxy it ruled. He would suffer the subtle attacks against him, and even the more overt ones against his aide, for there was a reason he was in the Emperor's service.

So when he learned of the Inquisitorious, he was naturally curious.

He had once asked Eli to elaborate on the Jedi. Eli stumbled through some of it - he admitted repeatedly that he was no expert - but was always very adamant that the Jedi were traitors. It was a common sentiment worded from nearly everyone Thrawn encountered. The Jedi had attempted a coup. The Emperor managed to thwart it.

So finding Force sensitive people in service to the Emperor seemed odd.

Odd enough that Thrawn requested a meeting with their leader.

Thrawn could detect a tut of annoyance from his aide when the Pau'an Force weilder only identified himself as the Grand Inquisitor. Thrawn noted that it was fairly odd - the man was so far removed from who he was that he only _wanted_ to be known by his title. By what he did. As if his identity no longer mattered. 

"You are half correct, Grand Admiral," the Inquisitor said when Thrawn asked about it, after he'd sent Eli away to go get them some caf. An unnecessary move, as the Pau'an had declined his polite offer, but Eli wore his heart on his sleeve. Eli had once said something about those who used the Force being able to read minds, and... well. Thrawn didn't know what kind of a man this agent of the Emperor was. "The Jedi erased my history. They only allowed human culture. I no longer remember the name my parents gave me. To the Jedi, it was difficult to pronounce and they gave me another."

"I see," Thrawn said. "Yet you serve an Empire which continues to propagate an ideal of human superiority."

The Grand Inquisitor smirked. "As do you."

"Fair enough," Thrawn said with a slight tilt of his head in deference. What he wanted to point out was the hypocracy of the Grand Inquisitor's logic - that he hated the Jedi for erasing his culture and replacing it with a human one, while at the same time serving an Emperor who would not even normally allow aliens to serve in his military. Thrawn was not here for that though. And Thrawn certainly could not risk allowing word of such treasonous arguments in logic getting back to the Emperor. He would allow the Pau'an to assume he'd won that round.

"Tell me, what is the role the Inquisitors play for the Emperor in building a more secure galaxy?"

The man's answer startled Thrawn to his core.

"The Inquisitorious investigates any rumor the Empire receives on those that appear to use the Force."

"I thought all the Jedi were extinct."

Not murdered. The Empire never used that word. _Extinct._ As if nature had chosen for their kind to vanish from the universe.

"A few managed to survive."

"The numbers you command appear to be overly abundantly for what is needed for a 'few' rogue survivors."

The Inquisitor smiled, revealing his pointed teeth. "The other Force Sensitives we investigate tend to be children."

The Grand Inquisitor left it at that, and Thrawn had to prompt for the obvious. "And if you find children, what do you do?"

"We ask that they serve the Emperor."

"And if they don't?"

"They die."

Thrawn nodded slowly, his stomach turning. _Children._ His thoughts immediately rushed to his time in the Ascendency. The girls always at the helm on their ships. Some frightened and lonely after being removed from their families. The numerous times Thrawn had depended on their skill to try and protect the Chiss. The infinite amount of times Thrawn had taken the extra effort to build those girls up, to encourage them with genuine heart... the smiles on their faces when they did well. The tears they shed when they felt used... felt like mere tools... and how often Thrawn left rank and position aside to ensure that they knew they were much more than that.

He'd long suspected the Chiss navigators were a variant of the Force Sensitives the Emperor's galaxy had wiped out. He had never spoken a word of it to Eli. Or anyone else outside of Chiss space.

But now, images swirled in his head of children... too young to comprehend what they even were, asked to make a choice they were too young to make. How many had been simply kidnapped from their families? How many had suffered a fate identical to the one that had shaped the man before him?

How many had he killed?

Thrawn returned to the present, burying his thoughts.

"I see."

"Yet it is clear that you do not."

An uncomfortable silence lingered. Thrawn could hardly remark on the situation. His nature was not one to speak lies to merely please those around him, yet he could not dare allow himself to speak about a project of the Emperor's to one of his own agents. The Inquisitor's eyes narrowed, as if focusing. As if attempting to tease out an answer in Thrawn's mind.

Eli returned with caf, looking thoroughly annoyed, and provided a distraction at last. Or at least a way for Thrawn to get out of having to discuss the merits of murdering children.

The Grand Inquisitor declined the caf. Thrawn did too.

Eli looked even more annoyed as he left the room again to get rid of them.

"You disappoint me, Grand Admiral," the Inquisitor said. "I've heard many rumors about you. About cleverness and tactical prowless. Nothing about pointless pleasantries."

"It was not pointless."

The meeting was over.


End file.
